Sam & Max: Saves the World Tips

I've tested 4 out of the 6 episodes so far, but it seems like that covers the ones people seemed to be having trouble with. The game is very nearly perfect and completely sold me on CrossOver, but there are a few issues. Some of these may be limited to Crossover Mac based on some comments I've seen.

Background

Sam and Max Season 1 is available from at least 5 sources:
* Downloadable from Telltale Games
* DVD from Telltale (free with purchase of the downloadable full season from Telltale Games)
* Downloadable from Steam
* Downloadable from Gametap
* Retail box as a CD set or single DVD

What works?

People seem to be reporting success with the Steam and Gametap versions, and the CD/DVD retail set apparently works with a patch available from Telltale. However, I've only personally tested the first two sources. Bottom line, if you're dealing with Telltale's versions directly, use the downloaded episodes and you should be golden with minor quirks. The games play through beautifully, with no real noticable speed problems. I can run it in full screen or window mode and flip between the game and other applications without a problem. If I didn't know better, I'd think it was written for the Mac.

What doesn't work?

* The DVD version of the game (from Telltale, available if you purchase the entire season from the web site) fails to run the autolaunch program properly. It sits at a white box that doesn't go anywhere. However, running the installer on the CD directly works fine.

* Once installed from the DVD, the game launcher can't seem to recognize the disc and asks for a valid copy of the game to be inserted into the drive. (The DVD version uses Securom, which I've gathered has some issues on Mac.) If you have the DVD, you should also be able to download the game from Telltale, which solves this issue even though it's a bit annoying.

* When you open an episode (download version), it first displays a small panel in what seems to be HTML which normally shows a splash screen for the game with a link to the web site and a button to play the episode. In Crossover, it opens a box with a single text link that launches the game when clicked.

* The save/load screen is supposed to show a flipbook with 4 images per page, each of which is a picture of the scene that was saved with a date underneath. In Crossover, the text shows correctly but the image is just a black box.

* There are very minor 3D glitches. The only one I've really noticed semi-prominently is that some surfaces (moving people) can sometimes be a little more "glossy" than they should be. (That is, parts of people's heads seem to shine unnaturally.)